Two longtime prosecutors leaving state attorney office

Two top veteran homicide prosecutors are switching sides mid-career and exiting the state attorney's office.

Dan Galo, 50, and Craig Williams, 45, have prosecuted offenders in some of the most intense violent crimes, seeking the death penalty numerous times.

Williams most recently prosecuted the pair accused of killing a grandmother and slashing the throat of her 6-year-old grandson, and parachuted in to argue before jurors the case against the teens later found guilty in the savage rape of a Dunbar Village woman and her son.

Williams was plugged in at the last minute in the Dunbar case after a fellow prosecutor came down with appendicitis.

So why is the state's ringer leaving?

Williams, a prosecutor off and on for 16 years, said he would like to have remained one but grew unhappy with the climate and atmosphere inside the Palm Beach County State Attorney's Office.

"Anything that was good is gone," Williams said. "There is no happiness there anymore. I think you would see a mass exodus from the office if the economy was better. They made it clear people don't matter there anymore."

Williams, who earned a salary of about $85,000 was turned down for a raise when others were being given increases, he said.

He will start a solo practice in West Palm Beach, and do contract work for the Police Benevolent Association representing officers.

Galo, a prosecutor of more than 21 years, said his pressing reason for leaving is financial. With two kids in college and a third one on the way there, he is leaving for the potential to make more money Galo made $105,800 last year as a veteran prosecutor.

Galo declined to comment on the atmosphere inside the office.

Galo said his most well-known cases include successfully prosecuting two men involved in shooting dead three women at a Greenacres restaurant and the man who killed police officer Rocky Hunt.

Galo also helped prosecute millionaire Fred Keller for the murder of his wife.

It has been three or four years since prosecutors got raises, Galo said, and that is coupled with burgeoning caseloads as violence increases in the community. Galo said at his peak he was handling about 50 murder or violent crime cases for which the punishment was decades, or life, in prison.

"I loved being a prosecutor and will look fondly back upon it," Galo said.

State Attorney Michael McAuliffe said the opportunity to earn more money elsewhere is a constant challenge to keeping senior prosecutors in the office. McAuliffe said he had not heard before of Williams' unhappiness with the climate in the office.

"I can happily and easily say we will miss them both," McAuliffe said, "but we won't miss a beat."

McAuliffe restructured the homicide unit at the state attorney's office in the spring, with the goal of assigning prosecutors to a homicide case who will stay with the case from the start through trial.

Taking over Galo's cases will be Assistant State Attorney Jacqueline Charbonneau; taking over Williams' cases will be Assistant State Attorney Barbara Burns, also a veteran of homicide cases. Williams had 14 trials set between January and May; Galo had about eight trials set in the same period.

"I think while it's a loss to the office, we more than make up for it in the replacements," McAuliffe said.